Ulster fona/CAB Ulster MFC
Dungiven 2-11 Burren 3-6
Photographs: Bert Trowlen
St. Canice Dungiven and St. Mary’s Burren served up an entertaining Ulster U17 fona/cab semi-final at St. Paul’s on Sunday with the result in the balance right up to the final whistle with man of the match, Odhran Murphy swinging it in Dungiven’s direction in the end.
The St. Canice’s full-forward opened the scoring after his colleague, Odhran McElhinney pulled off a great save to deny the opposition in the opening minutes and followed up to make it 0-3 to 0-0 after Eoin Higgins had added a second.
Burren had gone close with that opening effort on goal and finally breeched the Dungiven defence when Odhran McAuley got on the end of an excellent build up to fire past McElhinney and bring the sides level.
The Derry champions were quickly back in front with a goal of their own and Donach McGonigle was the man who applied the finish after a flowing move opened up the Down champions defence and with Murphy adding some excellent points they led 1-5 to 1-2 at the interval and were good value for that lead.
St. Mary’s opened the second half strongly and points from Shea Begley and the impressive Odhran McAuley saw them close the gap to the minimum and it looked like we had a game on our hands.
Odhran Murphy replied for St. Canice’s to extend their lead but Burren were now enjoying the better of the exchanges and Donagh Murdock split the posts before Oisin McStay took advantage of a McElhinney mistake to put the Down champions ahead.
Dungiven regrouped with Odhran Murphy leading the way with a couple of long range points and two more from Eoin Higgins saw them edge in front before Murphy followed up on an excellent save from the penalty spot by Ronan Downey to return his original effort to the net.
Things were certainly livening up and Burren relied with their third goal of the game when Darren Mussen converted a penalty at the other end to close the gap to the minimum but that was as close as they got and it was Odhran Murphy with another fine long range effort who concluded the scoring to see the Derry champions through to the New Year’s Day final.
Dungiven: 1 Odhran McElhinney, 2 Kian O’Connor, 3 Jack Dunne, 4 Donnach Colgan, 5 Padraig Harran, 6 Kevin Barry Mullin, 7 Joe Dillon, 8 Eoin Higgins, 9 Bobby Butcher, 10 Shea McLaughlin, 11 Padraig O’Kane, 12 Darach McGonigle, 13 Conor Gaile, 14 Odhran Murphy, 15 Darragh O’Neill
Burren: 1 Ronan Downey, 2 Mikel Farrugia, 3 Sean Fitzpatrick, 4 Tiarnan Serridge, 5 Arthur King 6 Callum Woods, 7 Odhran MacAuley, 8 Shea Begley, 9 Cormac Ward, 10 Donagh Murdock, 11 Dara Mussen, 12 Conall McKinley, 13 Joe McLoughlin, 14 Oisin McStay, 15 Charlie O’Hare
